In general, the toy business may be said to be a very competitive business, so that not only the nature and appearance of a toy come into play in the first instance when it is being displayed for sale at retail stores, but in some instances even the function and quality of the toy when in use become important in the attempt to convince purchasers to buy any specific toy product. In general, the toys may be displayed in packaging or illustrated on the packaging; and in some circumstances the packaging may be interactive in that it may permit a prospective purchaser to press a button or squeeze the toy to hear a sound or observe some other function of the toy. However, there is a class of toy for which a greater interactivity between the packaged toy and the prospective purchaser is desirable.
That class of toy comprises toy projectors, which are typically inexpensive devices housed in plastic casings, and which apart from having a focusable lens may have few or no other function controls. Typically there may be a variety of program material which is loaded into the toy projector for viewing. The nature of such program material is beyond the scope of the present invention, and it is sufficient to say that typically the program material comprises cartridges having filmstrips or cartoons installed therein, filmstrips or other interactive electronic program material related to a book, or the like, whereby the pages of the book may be projected at the same time as they are being read or are intended to be read by the viewer, or further, still photographs or other images, or the like.
Once the toy projector has been purchased, it may be set upon a table or very often is hand held, whereby the program material contained in the projector may be viewed by pointing the projector at a wall, a screen, a door, or other appropriate and light reflecting surface. The intended projection length may range from 10 or 20 cm up to 2 to 5 meters or more. Accordingly, most such toy projectors are equipped with a focusable lens.
Allowing the purchaser to preview the projector display, and fully appreciate its display capabilities, would be desirable to ensure a successful sale.
Similarly, purchasers of any type of projector systems, including more sophisticated projectors in general, or alternatively, electronic digital projectors, would also benefit from being able to observe the display capabilities of the projector since these types of devices are currently typically sold in closed cases or boxes.